Sexual harassment in housing and workplaces

“Harassment” in this section means comments or actions based on sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression that are unwelcome to you or should be known to be unwelcome. They may include humiliating or annoying conduct. Harassment requires a “course of conduct,” which means that a pattern of behaviour or more than one incident is usually required for a claim to be made to the Tribunal. However, a single significant incident may be offensive enough to be considered sexual harassment.

A high school student gets a failing grade on her essay because she refused her teacher’s sexual advances. A factory worker repeatedly turns down her foreman’s requests for a date, and suddenly sees her work hours reduced. A single mother gets evicted because she won’t have sex with her landlord.

Toronto – A new policy on preventing sexual and gender-based harassment was launched today by the Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC) in partnership with the Ryerson Students’ Union, Ryerson University and the CAW-Sam Gindin Chair in Social Justice and Democracy, Ryerson University.

2011 - Sexual and gender-based harassment are kinds of discrimination. They can hurt a person’s dignity, make them feel unsafe and stop them from reaching their full potential. Sexually harassing or bullying someone because of their sex, gender or sexual orientation is not acceptable. It is against the law.

6.1 Protections

Under the Ontario’s Human Rights Code, trans people and other gender non-conforming individuals are protected from discrimination and harassment because of gender identity and gender expression in five social areas:[23]